I took my last Spanish class sometime in 1996 at Cornell University. Just in case you suck at math, that’s a really long time ago.

Against the odds, I have maintained decent Spanish comprehension plus a convincing accent thanks to a teacher from Madrid. She didn’t mess around. But my speaking skills are rusty.

For a long time, I have wanted to revive my Spanish skills but until recently, I failed to take action. And then I realized that Fluent City has a location near my apartment. It was time.

I recently took Fluent Brooklyn’s Bridge to Level 3 Spanish workshop. It was cool! The instructor swears I’m ready for Level 3 but I’m tempted to go back to Level 2. We’ll see.

If you want to check out Fluent City, use my discount code FriendsofOneCHICKLETTE to receive 15% off classes. Offer expires October 10.

Want to read more about my adventures with language instruction? See below.

Note: this isn’t a sponsored post. I paid for my workshop.

At my junior-senior high school, all students were required to take a language. Unlike some students, I was so excited about the prospect. I chose Spanish.

Actually, that’s only partially true. I wanted to learn Spanish, but I enrolled in Latin, thinking I might go to medical school someday.* But only one other student in my grade signed up for Latin–yes a fellow member of my gifted class/nerdmobile–so the school told us they wouldn’t offer Latin and we had to choose Spanish or German.

I entered Spanish class, thinking I’d end the year more or less fluent. My previous tastes of language instruction had been encouraging. I’d been quick to pick up vocabulary and accents.

But then, Intro to Spanish happened. The teacher, who just wanted us to STFU, taught us that the Spanish word for she “ella” was pronounced “ELL-yuh” instead of the correct way “EH-yuh.” And that’s when he bothered to try to teach us anything at all.

In year 2 of Spanish (yes, I stuck with it), the teacher suffered a stroke and our class was taken over by a long term substitute. She actually spoke Spanish, and well so the state we were in was both shocking and appalling to her. We started at the very beginning.

For reasons I’m not clear about, this smart, patient teacher wasn’t brought back as a full-time teacher the following year and that played a big role in me ending my high school Spanish adventure.

And then I got to Cornell University. My psychology major required two or three semesters of a language and although I probably could have tested out (all written, nothing oral), I decided to throw myself back into the baby pool.

And I loved it. At one point, I considered changing my major to Spanish, but didn’t thinking “what kind of job could I get with a Spanish degree?” Silly me.

But I’m back now, Spanish. See you again soon Fluent Brooklyn.

*You read that right. Med school. Me. The one who is allergic to formaldehyde.